List of Attacks

The Myth:

Muhammad Lived at
Peace with the Jews

Part 1:
The Banu Qaynuqa

The Truth:

The early
part of the Quran was written while Muhammad lived in Mecca, a town with very
few Jews and no Jewish tribes. At the time, he presented himself to the
Meccans as a Jewish prophet based on the stories that he learned from those Jews
whom he met on his travels – and from his cousin Waraqa, a convert from Judaism
(the Quran actually addresses this accusation, as "Allah" denies it).

When Muhammad relocated to Medina, there were three Jewish tribes living there
already whose good graces he needed to stay in (initially) since he and his small
band of Muslim immigrants were in a position of relative weakness. He
tried to convince these Jews that he was the last in the succession of their own
prophets and even changed the Qibla (direction of prayer) toward Jerusalem, the
center of the Jewish world (Ibn Ishaq/Hisham 382).

The Jews at Medina were not impressed with Muhammad’s esoteric claims,
particularly since there were obvious discrepancies between their Torah and his
version of the same stories. (In the Quran, history from the Bible is
presented immaturely, and sounds more like a series of fairy tales with the same
redundant moral – believe in Muhammad’s claims about himself or face earthly destruction and eternal torment).

When asked why he didn’t provide proof of his prophethood by performing some
sort of miracle, as the prophets of the past had done, Muhammad came up with a
clever excuse by saying that there was no point in doing so since the Jews had
"rejected" past prophets anyway (Quran
3:183-184).
Thus, Muhammad had nothing to offer but his own testimony. The Jewish tribes declined:
"Nay, we will follow what we found our father doing." (Ibn Ishaq/Hisham 382).

The prophet of Islam did not handle the Jewish rejection well, particularly
since his people had been relying heavily on his many claims of
being a prophet in the same mode as Moses, Abraham and Jesus. Muhammad
"resolved" his dilemma by claiming that the Jews of Medina were heretics and he
arbitrarily dismissed their version of the Torah by claiming that they had
corrupted it and "hidden" the verses that supported his claims of being a
prophet. (Interestingly, despite the many Jews who converted to Islam,
either out of compulsion or free will, no one ever produced the "uncorrupted"
Torah that was supposed to have existed).

Following Muhammad’s victory against the Meccans at
Badr, his wealth and power had increased to the point of being able to take
care of his "Jew problem." The words of the Quran become noticeably
harsher toward the “People of the Book” in the Medina portion of the text, and
his actions become confrontational, even violent (Ibn Ishaq/Hisham 362).

Although much is made of the “Constitution” of Medina, the treaty that Muhammad
created for all of the local tribes on his arrival, contemporary Muslims are
often reluctant to admit the injunction that cancelled out this treaty less than
two years later:

"While
we were in the Mosque, the Prophet came out and said, "Let us go to the Jews" We
went out till we reached Bait-ul-Midras. He said to them, "If you embrace Islam,
you will be safe. You should know that the earth belongs to Allah and His
Apostle, and I want to expel you from this land. So, if anyone amongst you owns
some property, he is permitted to sell it, otherwise you should know that the
Earth belongs to Allah and His Apostle." (Bukhari
53:392)

Having announced his intentions, Muhammad looked for an excuse to take land from those
Jews who refused to convert to Islam. His first target was a tribe that
had recently been aligned in a conflict against the other two. Muhammad
guessed correctly that the other Jewish tribes would not come to the assistance
of the Banu Qaynuqa if he laid siege to them.

Muhammad’s excuse is said to be an incident in which a Muslim was killed by an angry Jewish
mob. That the mob was angry because the Muslim in question had just
murdered a Jewish merchant over a woman's honor is sometimes
conveniently forgotten by
contemporary apologists, who nonetheless admit that Muhammad chose to lay siege
to the Qaynuqa stronghold rather than mediate a peaceful resolution to the
agitation.

This point is important. According to Muslim historians, the first
blood shed was when a Jew was murdered by a Muslim for playing a prank on a
Muslim woman (by lifting her dress). The Muslim was killed in retaliation
by those who had just witnessed the murder.

On what basis is physical violence - much less murder - justified by a prank
of this sort? Moreover, if Muhammad believed in the Old Testament law of
"an eye for an eye," why did he not recognize the legitimacy of the second
killing against the disparity of the first?

In any event, the self-proclaimed prophet of God responded with self-serving
force against a people that had welcomed him to their community less than two
years earlier. Unprepared for battle, the Qaynuqa surrendered
to their former guest without a fight.

Muhammad wished to slay the entire tribe outright, but was talked out of it by a
mutual Arab friend, who was horrified by his intentions:

Abdullah b. Ubayy b. Salul went to him when God had put them in his power and said, “O
Muhammad, deal kindly with my clients” (now they were allies of Khazraj), but
the apostle put him off. He repeated the words, and the apostle turned
away from him, whereupon he thrust his hand into the collar of the apostle's
robe; the apostle was so angry that his face became almost black. He said,
“Confound you, let me go.” He answered, “No, by God, I will not let you go
until you deal kindly with my clients. Four hundred men without mail and
three hundred mailed protected me from all mine enemies; would you cut them down
in one morning? By God, I am a man who fears that circumstances may
change”' The apostle said, “You can have them.” (Ibn Ishaq/Hisham 546)

Muhammad was thus talked into allowing the Jews of Qaynuqa to escape only with a few
tools and the clothes on their back. He confiscated their wealth and land,
taking a fifth for himself and giving the rest to the other Muslims.
(According to the Qur’an, this was their punishment for not believing in
Muhammad
3:10-12).

The man who had saved the lives of the Jews was later called a hypocrite by Muhammad, and it
is evident that he deeply regretted his decision not to slay the Qaynuqa.
One of the nine Quranic verses that prohibit Muslims from taking Jews and
Christians as friends was “revealed” at this time.

Thus was Muhammad able to fulfill his own promise that “those who resist Allah and his
Messenger will be humiliated” (Quran
58:20), further solidifying his credibility
with the Muslims – and inspiring fourteen centuries of relentless Jihad in the
name of following his example.